#viciven

so basically...if alfor was still alive we’d likely get an unrequited love lofor arc. since, alfor wouldn’t approve of lotor’s plans, if he knew the truth of them. or, wait for it, we’d get a lofor daddy dynamic relationship until alfor learns that lotor is too corrupt to influence positively anymore, and then he breaks things off

WELCOME TO LOFOR HELL!!! it’s good cursed fun here. 

canon lofor au where alfor still put allura in cryosleep and went on fighting zarkon. during that time lotor grew, learned the ways of the galra, commanded a planet or two, became disillusioned with his father’s empire, and sought alfor and hte altean rebellion out. he studied under alfor learning as much as he possibly could about altean alchemy and connecting with his not-so-lost-after-all heritage. 

lotor’s daddy issues show up strong in this au and alfor goes from being a tenuous ally to admired mentor to lover. Kinky Shennanigans. 

flash forward to zarkon picking up on his son’s prolonged absences, change of mannerisms, change in leadership style, and for one of the first times haggar tracks/spies on lotor to follow his actions across space. that’s right [drama] lotor is the reason the altean rebellion is found. zarkon zips up in his massive command station to continue picking fights with alfor. 

the zarkon alfor duel is still epic. lotor is standing on the sidelines screaming like a damsel for them to stop fighting. it’s all very dramatic and tragic.

coppi keep talking lofor meta my interest is piqued

TOPAZZZZZ!!!!

welcome to rant meta, aka really rough drafts. 

basically lotor built his style of leadership based off of alfor but with galra leanings for obvious reasons. lotor is very much still on board with imperialist practices but it’s a much softer version because he pulled from a lot of altean practices and ideologies. 

looking at the story lotor recounts to allura in oriande about mining a planet for quintessence, what he was doing is the in-between of how galra and alteans interact with planets. because the galra under zarkon’s rule take from a planet until it’s completely depleted and then leave it to rot or completely destroy it. alteans on the other hand take from a planet but give something in return, the most specific example we have is the balmerans where an altean will give quintessence for a crystal. but it’s also implied that alteans traded technology, knowledge, and other resources with various planets in exchange for needed resources. 

it’s easy to assume lotor warped a lot of altean ideology because of his galra upbringing. but i suspect he didn’t have to warp it too much. because there are examples and implications of alteans behaving a bit more dubiously than allura would like to admit. the most specific example that comes to mind is harvesting skultrite from a weblum, not that this is explicit but it is invasive and there’s no explanation as to if the weblum benefits from this and the harvesting relies on antagonizing the creature. additionally alteans were involved in wars which often are filled with morally grey areas. and there’s honerva to consider who was very much altean, as far as we know she was born and raised on the planet, likely in manners similar to alfor and coran. 

so while alteans overall can be considered “good” that doesn’t mean they can’t be questionable. and its likely lotor would have picked up on some of those questionable tendencies, especially if it meant he could gain an upper hand or achieve something by using those tactics. 

other points to consider: 

lotor likely learned much of what he knows about alfor through honerva’s and other scientific logs so he wasn’t getting a sense of alfor, the person, but rather alfor, the alchemist. and then maybe in political / war time records so alfor, the politician. 

lotor desperately wanted to connect himself to his altean heritage as a means to keep his mother’s memory and legacy alive. he may have been treating alfor as a self insert lmao

the relationship between honerva and alfor was an academic peer relationship so even though there was a lot of respect between the two, there was always an edge of competition. lotor would definitely have picked up on that. so while he would respect alfor and his wealth of knowledge, he still would take every opportunity he had to challenge alfor and prove himself. 

lotor hates sendak even more when he learns sendak’s the reason allura had to destroy alfor’s AI.